ceremonially, firstwith wine, like Magdalene, anointing and anointed,in the name of the mother, Sun and holy ghosts
|cabernet henna|then, with rainwater from the willow’s edge, like Ophelia,lying in the woodland and meadow, floodedto cleanse or drown [to be, or not to be]in the name of the Moon

A clear memory recorded and archived tonight
An acute awareness of myself
tonight, in time and place
a new track to play on loop for a listener in my future life

a husband, friend, or son
a caregiver, a kind one
a visitor, volunteer, or nurse,
a grandson, or maybe, no one

A reddish dog, eating mulberries
from the sidewalk in shadows
Mottled concrete in the dim light of a city street lamp
obscured by the canopy of that beautiful, June, fruit tree

A woman, middle aged, seems so young, even a tad pretty, in her mind’s eye
Stretching her still strong body upward for plump, dark berries
Reaching for branches trimmed too high by the urban foresters
or arborists or surgeons, I forget what they’re called

On her tippy toes
grabbing, pulling, picking
squeezing the dog’s leash between her thighs
don’t get loose in the dark, don’t get skunked in the dark

Some of the best ones are lost in the awkward tussle
before she can palm them, save them, taste them
She triggers a reverberative rain from boughs on high
That precise, delicate sweetness of the bounty in her mouth

The dog’s belly full of the ripe windfall
sustained by both gravity and woman
His name was Woody, or Digby, I think
He used to climb into our sleep

She and that dog
Always urban foragers and gleaners in June
All month long, her fingertips, heels and lips
tinted with their fuchsia dye, didn’t think to check his paws

A clear, melancholy recollection
This day, that day was also her son’s birthday
The first birthday he spent away from home, Nebraska, or Alaska, I think
That glorious tree, that good dog, that golden boy

The Engineer is unfathomably removed; the Operator is a remote-controlled animatronic, and it seems impossible to hack the controls or jam the gears of the Samsaric Ferris Wheel. The centripetal force both anchors and disorients its occupants – the ride is super-soul-powered by the heavy, endless and ever-increasing mass of humanity.

It’s over-capacity, but I see that this Wheel will never collapse, spinning simultaneously slower and faster – hell, they’re still selling-out tickets. The line to ride is infinitely lengthening, and the Designer is invested in the energy of the eternal revolution of these souls.

I’ve been in this gondola for a while now. When I first boarded, it felt foreign, artificial and uncomfortable, yet it smelled fresh, clean and new, and promised sensuality and excitement, but then I began to recognize some of the other carriages –a familiarity alternating with déjà vu. And there’s a persistence of thought that I may’ve occupied some of the others – I can’t be certain of it though. Some of the landscape seems familiar – fleetingly pleasant, moments of strikingly beauty, but now turning and turning increasingly mundane, sickening, frightening and horrifying.

A camouflaged, serpentine concessionaire slides across and around the sparkling blue and brilliant green structure, interrupting my outward, searching gaze, and whispering the offer of endogenous “refreshments” – a selective offering of ancient, yet succulent apples to any occupant whose blindfold is removed and whose eyes are opened wide:

“Take eat, this is the knowledge that’s been concealed from view; take drink, this is the covenant returned to you?”

Famished and parched for Truth, I take the apple presented to me. My first taste – full of the bitterness of Truth, its juice stinging my heart first, then my throat, my eyes, my ears, my nose, but then I feel its sweet momentum of gnourishment. Ravenous, I bite clean through it, revealing a cross section of the core. There, lies a golden filigree key – the key to my restraint system — a harness and a “safety” bar. Beneath the key – five golden seeds embedded in the five-pointed flower-star of the apple — one is marked ‘he’, and I intuitively know – this is the seed of my Twin – I am his Horcrux tethering a part of him here, and it is also my Red Pill. I tuck it under my tongue, not swallowing yet, and clasp the other four seeds in my left hand.

I free myself with the key, standing up and rocking the carriage fearlessly, and the Wheel Operator takes notice. I’ve been in spinning in the gondola marked 8 Black, but the House is always ahead on this Roulette, and losses, though infrequent, are built into the system. My departure is inconsequential.

My mass dissolving, my definitions fading rapidly, free of Gravity – flesh and graves, I float out and upward, passerby to more opulent and pious gondolas, and ascending above and beyond the Wheel for my very first vista of the Horizon of Light and Dark, of the Continents of Carnival and Circus, of the Oceans of Origin, and the vast expanse of the Universe of Space and Stars. The Illusion of the Grandeur of Earth and the Heavens is revealed to me, and I am momentarily uneasy. This House and Sky is all I may have ever known, but for the Grace.

But I can only save myself, turning toward the faces of the blindfolded – the blind souls – the greedy, the violent, the hateful, the miserable, and the content, the naïve, the decent, the ignorant, among them; I glimpse other seekers too, burgeoning spirits with blindfolds askew or off, eyes opening slightly and slowly like the newly born. I toss the Four Seeds to the Four Directions of the Winds, as Johnny Appleseed to the eternally dying.

With a nod to the serpent,

I swallow the Fifth one, and so begins the beautifully and fully conscious destruction of my remaining matter and the remnants of the ego of my false being.

At last and forevermore, the existence of the Ever-and-Omnipresent vortex – comprised of unfathomable, vacuous, darkness of non-being and unfathomable radiant, lightness of pure-being is revealed to me.

Within this co-existence of Emptiness and Fullness, the Essence of Non-being and Being weave into the seamless blanket of the Pleroma – It enfolds me, envelops me, swallows me, be-comes me.